Whats amazing to me is the position that Muslims take on this. They say that:

There is no compulsion in Islam.

I think they say this because of the criticism they get from non-Muslims about the fact that their Quran explicitly tells Muslims to use physical force for various types of situations, including killing apostates.

You can find any evil thing you want in the Old Testament. The programming is just how the humans subjectively use the holy books.

No doubt the current Muslim terrorists programming is much, much worse than the current Christian programming.

Agreed.

One important difference between today’s Muslims and today’s Christians is that among Muslims, they have a tradition of taking their holy book literally, while Christians have gotten rid of that tradition a long time ago.

How many Christians do you know? This is causing you to lose a lot of credibility with me.

My son goes to Christian school. They teach that the Bible is the literal word of God. I have gone to many, many different Christian Churches with my wife, they all preach the doctrine of a literal bible. You are greatly uninformed and grossly wrong on this issue.

How else can you know if they regard the Bible as the literal word of God?

Consider Europe. They are not Bible thumpers. Your view seems to be extrapolated from just Texas.

You did not confine your statement to Europe. I don’t live in europe, I base my comments on Christianity from Christians in the USA. (where we both reside) You made a universal statement that ..... “christians no longer considered the Bible the literal word of God” You are wrong about that YES or NO??

GenerousGeorge - 22 November 2012 04:22 PM

This is causing you to lose a lot of credibility with me.

Truth is not determined by credibility.

No, but truth establishes credibility and when you affirm things that are obviously untrue, you lose credibility with everything you claim to have extensive knowledge on.

GenerousGeorge - 22 November 2012 04:22 PM

My son goes to Christian school. They teach that the Bible is the literal word of God.

So, do they think that they should kill apostates? [I only mention this because you said that the “kill apostate” idea can be found in the Bible.]

If you asked them, they would weasel around the answer, and make excuses but still maintain the Bible as the literal word of God? You sometimes ask questions to avoid the main issue. In this case, in case you have forgotten it is whether or not many, many Christians regard the Bible as the literal word of God.

GenerousGeorge - 22 November 2012 04:22 PM

I have gone to many, many different Christian Churches with my wife, they all preach the doctrine of a literal bible. You are greatly uninformed and grossly wrong on this issue.

Because only a small percentage of self-identified Christians attend Church or go to a private Christian school. And even among this group, their actions (and thus their values) don’t mimic the Bible literally.

GenerousGeorge - 22 November 2012 05:41 PM

Consider Europe. They are not Bible thumpers. Your view seems to be extrapolated from just Texas.

You did not confine your statement to Europe. I don’t live in europe, I base my comments on Christianity from Christians in the USA. (where we both reside) You made a universal statement that ..... “christians no longer considered the Bible the literal word of God” You are wrong about that YES or NO??

You’re right. I think you’re referring to this: “One important difference between today’s Muslims and today’s Christians is that among Muslims, they have a tradition of taking their holy book literally, while Christians have gotten rid of that tradition a long time ago.”

I should have said “most Christians have gotten rid of that tradition a long time ago. That tradition of taking their holy book literally is much more widespread among Muslims. Also, among the literal Muslims and Christians, the Muslim group produces more problems than the Christian group does. And those problems are caused by evil actions. This is the point I was trying to make.

GenerousGeorge - 22 November 2012 04:22 PM

This is causing you to lose a lot of credibility with me.

Truth is not determined by credibility.

No, but truth establishes credibility and when you affirm things that are obviously untrue, you lose credibility with everything you claim to have extensive knowledge on.

I don’t want you to consider my ideas on credibility. Please consider my creditability to be zero, or whatever the lowest number on your scale is. I want you to consider my ideas on the merit of them alone. I want you to question and criticize every flaw you see.

GenerousGeorge - 22 November 2012 04:22 PM

My son goes to Christian school. They teach that the Bible is the literal word of God.

So, do they think that they should kill apostates? [I only mention this because you said that the “kill apostate” idea can be found in the Bible.]

If you asked them, they would weasel around the answer, and make excuses but still maintain the Bible as the literal word of God? You sometimes ask questions to avoid the main issue. In this case, in case you have forgotten it is whether or not many, many Christians regard the Bible as the literal word of God.

A significant percentage of (maybe most) Muslims would not weasel around the answer. They come right out and declare that ex-Muslims should be killed. And some Muslims actually do kill apostates.

Do Texan Christians kill people that have sex before marriage? Muslims do.

GenerousGeorge - 22 November 2012 04:22 PM

I have gone to many, many different Christian Churches with my wife, they all preach the doctrine of a literal bible. You are greatly uninformed and grossly wrong on this issue.